travel

[rikita]

do you also always get somewhat nervous before a trip? and kind of surprised that the evening before leaving is already there? and you still have so much to prepare?

oh well, i suppose as soon as i am on my way i will be happy, just currently i keep going through all kinds of problems...

[Deleted]

For years, I was very nervous, but now I am excessively relaxed and I wish that I were not. I have actually left my flat without bothering to pick up ticket or passport and had to climb back upstairs to get them just before walking out of the door of the building.

In the old days, I would have baggage and documents ready and impossible to forget at least 3 days before departure.

[rikita]

oh i still forget things and often pack last minute (though this time i started packing two days ago, as for a bike trip some more logistics are involved with how to pack and stuff)... i just always start wondering if what i chose is really the right thing, whether the trip will work out the way i want, whether i might not have unrealistic plans (like, in this case, i have no idea how much i can currently cycle with my new bike, so not sure if my itinerary is doable...)

i guess i got that from my mom. i just suddenly think of so many things that can go wrong and start thinking whether it might not be so much nicer to stay at my safe home in front of hte computer. as i said, as soon as i am on my way the worries are gone, but right now they are there...

[Deleted]

I am always anxious before travel. Even if I have everything packed,arranged etc.,I am keyed up. I know that I got this from my mother. The return trip is not so bad somehow, it's usually the destination of origin that I'm nervous about.
I try to get the earliest flight there is if flying ,so as to just get it over with ,as I generally don't sleep well the night before anyway.
Bon voyage rikita,have a great trip and bring us back lots of stories for those of us who are stuck. And be safe.

[traveler63]

Nervous, but better than when we started. I really can't sleep and that's not great when its an overnight trip. After 9-11, it just gets to be a hassle, trying to keep up with all of the rules and regs. Now, if you are flying out of the U. S. boy, your name on your tickets have to exactly match the ID that you are using, letter for letter or you might denied boarding. I also always pack too many clothes, so this time I am going to try to do better. I figure if I need something it will give me an excuse to go shopping in Paris!!!!!

[rikita]

well, am up now and getting ready... wanted to get as early a start as possible, but was too tired to get up earlier... well it isn't even eight yet, so i guess i will have left the house before nine... just hope the weather holds... and i get all my luggage attached to my bike somehow...

[bixaorellana]

Have a great trip! Be careful, but have fun.

[rikita]

thanks!

[bjd]

I guess it's too late to wish Rikita a nice cycling holiday, since it's past 10 in W Europe.

I don't get too nervous before travelling -- I make lists of what to take, and I tend to put things I need in a pile. I do the final packing the day before. But I do like to leave early in the morning -- otherwise, I just poke around ready to leave.

I also know how to pack light -- it's a question of experience after my second trip to Europe when I was young. By the time we got to Amsterdam from London, I had packed most of what I had brought and sent it home. Spent the next 3 months with a small bag.

[Deleted]

Another really annoying thing that happens to me and I now take great pains to prevent is taking along an adequate snack of some kind. I am never hungry before going ,due to nerves ,and would consequently not eat. Midway into the flight or train ride I feel my blood sugar dropping and become ravenous,irritable etc. I now take along something to tide me over until I can get some decent food in me.

[lola]

Yes, rikita. Predictably a few days to a week or so before a trip I'll start questioning my decision to go and wish I didn't have to. I drive to my home town tomorrow, planned for months, and now it's only knowing I'm expected that makes me go through with it.

Yet when I get there I'll be reluctant to go home. So it must be sheer tendency of an object at rest (me) to remain at rest.

[Deleted]

I hope Rikita has forgotten us completely by now. (but that she will remember us after her holiday)

[bixaorellana]

I hope she's taking pictures!

[tillystar]

Oh I hope Rikita is having a good time. I hope she is taking lots of pictures too for us all to ahve a good nose at.

I am waaaaaaaaay too relaxed and pack at the last possible second and arrive at the airport at the last possible millisecond too. I can't bear hanging around airports and vary wildly between the "knickers, passport, tickets" and the "chuck everything you might ever need in to be safe as no time to think" schools of packing.

My dearest darling husband (she says through gritted teeth) on the other hand is a bloody nervous wreck before travelling makes mental lists weeks in advance, which he repeats to me until I am nearly crazy and then insists on getting to the airport 3 days before we actually need to be there.

Hmmmm, I can't actually recall a time we have boarded a flight on speaking terms (but we are always friends again by take-off).

[Deleted]

And are you going anywhere soon? Have you packed your camera?

[gringalais]

For the past year or so, all my travel has been in the country, so it has been pretty relaxed, less preparation needed. Bolivia is requiring more planning. Since I have a US passport, I need a visa. First I had to get some more pages put in my passport since it is close to full and the visa takes up a whole page, and then there will be entry/exit stamps, of course. I just got paid, so now I can afford the visa cost, but I need to go buy some dollars to do so, get a photo taken and make a hotel reservation for the first night. My husband also needs to get a sleeping bag and is looking into whether or not he needs a yellow fever shot. Then I have to get my sleeping bag back from my friend who borrowed it months ago. I'm sure there is more, but that is what comes to mind right now.

[bixaorellana]

And you need time to air the sleeping bag well.

[lagatta]

Always nervous before travelling, terrified of forgetting passport, ticket - and now the latter is often just a computer printout - and the cash I take - I do take some cash, usually € these days - and other essential things. But I'm nervous and anxious about stuff like that in general, so travel is not really an exception.

Hope rikita has a wonderful time cycling. I wonder if I could do that any more - of course I ride my bicycle every single day except in the depth of winter, but I'm afraid of arthritic stiffness if I should try to do cycle touring any more. I'd have to take it too easy to go with the people I'd be most likely to travel alongside.

[tillystar]

And are you going anywhere soon? Have you packed your camera?

Yes! Stockholm and around its archipelago this coming weekend. I will definately pack the camera for a Stockhom picture fest. I am going to the wedding party for Northernbabe from Get Stuffed, I am sure it wll be great fun.

[bazfaz]

Give NB my love.

[gringalais]

Jul 24, 2009 23:01:25 GMT bixaorellana said:

And you need time to air the sleeping bag well.

Eww, maybe I should send it to the dry cleaners. We had a big shopping day for the trip yesterday. I took advantage of the end of winter sales to buy a nice new winter jacket (it will work for snowboarding, too) and some high-tech long underwear that is supposed to keep me warm and dry, and a few other clothing items. Looking at the average temperatures, the lows are quite a bit lower than we are used to here in Santiago, so I want to be prepared.

My husband bought his sleeping bag and picked up his passport on Saturday. It was more expensive than the last time I renewed my US passport and they look really cheap. We were joking it looks fake.

[rikita]

well, i am back now.

[Deleted]

I just bought more batteries for my camera, but I don't know if I'll be taking any pictures during my 3 days in Lorraine.

[bixaorellana]

Aug 5, 2009 23:46:46 GMT rikita said:

well, i am back now.

And undoubtedly making up a full, fun trip report for us, right?
Seriously, were you able to take any pictures? I imagine on a bike trip like that it might not be convenient to get off the bike, dig out the camera, etc. Still, it would be great to hear more about it.

Aug 8, 2009 13:48:49 GMT kerouac2 said:

I just bought more batteries for my camera, but I don't know if I'll be taking any pictures during my 3 days in Lorraine.

And this is ..... a threat? a tease? coyness?
You have so covered yourself with glory, not only with pictures but with exciting, interesting text to accompany them, I guess it's greedy to hope for even more. Even so .........

[lagatta]

Metz and Nancy are both beautiful cities, and I'm there are interesting views to take of old (and largely disaffected) industrial towns as well. Another aspect of that region I'd be interested in seeing is the TGV development - doesn't the TGV line go through there, as well as another line south to Strasbourg? I'm not quite clear on the route, or how far progress has got to Frankfurt and other towns in western Germany. Friends of mine living in Amsterdam have recently moved to the city/wee country of Luxemburg, not far from Lorraine.

And real men - tough miners and steelworkers - DID eat quiche!

[rikita]

a report... hm... that sounds like work... i took some pictures though not as many as usual (due to exactly the problem you mentioned), but knowing my pace i will have them ready for posting sometime around christmas...

well, i can post a bit here, but it will have to come in bits and pieces...

like, on the way going, i wanted to take the R1 cycling lane till the Harz mountains, and then from there cycle to Hildesheim, where my bf lives. Since I didn't see any need to cycle through Berlin, I took public transport out to Potsdam (till there my university ticket counts). But that was already adventurous since currently the local transport has some problems and is running on a low schedule - they recommend not taking bikes into the trains. So I chose a regional train instead, and it turned out I wasn't the only one. Lots of bikes in the train.

And my bike was so fully packed, it was difficult to get in and out the trains. I had planned to put my backpack on top of everything else, but that made my bike keel over backwards. So I decided to cycle with the backpack on my back. At the train station, I couldn't find an elevator, so I took the bike up the escalator. I often do that with an unpacked bike - but iwth the packed bike I couldn't get it back off the escalator when I was up at the platform. It started slipping back down. I got very scared and even started screaming - especially since there was a person a few metres behind me and I feared losing control of my bike and crashing it on her. But in the end, I managed. Turned out, the elevators were at the far end of the platform (and those even worked, when I returned, I had to take the escalator because the elevator was broken).

In Potsdam, it took quite a while to find the cycling lane. Actually, I was on it all the time, but didn't realize. I assumed the sign marking the R1 route - a green bike - was just the sign for the normal city cycling routes in Potsdam. But eventually I knew I was on the right way, though it was about an hour or two later than what I had planned as my leaving time. The first part of the cycling route goes along the rivers, canals and lakes south of Potsdam. The cycling lane itself is not hte greatest quality but still okay, and the landscape is pretty nice.

[bixaorellana]

Whew, I'm glad that when you finally got going, it turned out to be nice. That first part, with the heavy overbalanced bike sounds harrowing.